Make it meaningful

Random animation with no purpose? Nope.

Be mindful of the product or service you’re trying to promote. Sadly, the perfect illustration we designers tend to come up with isn’t actually what our client is trying to promote—it just looks beautiful, and that’s it.

“Just say no to meaningless animation.”

So, when animating something, ask yourself if you’re keeping your client’s objective in mind. Just as important: Ask whether you have your user’s best interest in mind.

This fun animation by Sergey Valiukh has purpose and then some—most notably, the transition from AM to PM. Static graphics would have the same effect but wouldn’t be as dynamic.

Animation shouldn’t be an afterthought

When you’re creating sketches or wireframes, think about how your elements will be animated. To make meaningful animations, you need to take time at the beginning of a project to really think about how they’ll fit into the user experience.

The Ramotion team shows us a nice example of thinking about animation/transitions during the wireframing stage.

Like design, animation can be subjective and personal. It’s so important to think about the people who will interact with the animations you create—every element should be carefully thought out so it adds to the overall user experience.